Wagner Electric Corporation was an electric equipment manufacturing firm established in 1891 that became part of

Studebaker-Worthington Studebaker-Worthington was a diversified American manufacturer created in 1967 through a merger of Studebaker-Packard Corporation, Wagner Electric and Worthington Corporation. The company was in turn acquired by McGraw-Edison in 1979. Origins Fou ...

in 1967.

History

Wagner Electric Corporation was founded by Herbert Appleton Wagner and Ferdinand Schwedtmann (aka Francis Charles Schwedtman) in 1891. The company manufactured electric engines,

electric motor An electric motor is an Electric machine, electrical machine that converts electrical energy into mechanical energy. Most electric motors operate through the interaction between the motor's magnetic field and electric current in a Electromagneti ...

s and electric starters for early

automobile A car or automobile is a motor vehicle with Wheel, wheels. Most definitions of ''cars'' say that they run primarily on roads, Car seat, seat one to eight people, have four wheels, and mainly transport private transport#Personal transport, pe ...

s. They also made

electric light An electric light, lamp, or light bulb is an electrical component that produces light. It is the most common form of artificial lighting. Lamps usually have a base made of ceramic, metal, glass, or plastic, which secures the lamp in the soc ...

s and many other electric-related products. In 1909, Wagner Electric started manufacturing their first automotive

headlamp A headlamp is a lamp attached to the front of a vehicle to illuminate the road ahead. Headlamps are also often called headlights, but in the most precise usage, ''headlamp'' is the term for the device itself and ''headlight'' is the term for ...

bulbs In botany, a bulb is structurally a short stem with fleshy leaves or leaf basesBell, A.D. 1997. ''Plant form: an illustrated guide to flowering plant morphology''. Oxford University Press, Oxford, U.K. that function as food storage organs durin ...

. The International Association of Machinists held a strike at the Wagner Electric Company in

St. Louis, Missouri St. Louis () is the second-largest city in Missouri, United States. It sits near the confluence of the Mississippi River, Mississippi and the Missouri Rivers. In 2020, the city proper had a population of 301,578, while the Greater St. Louis, ...

from June 4 to October 7, 1918. Before it became part of a conglomerate, Wagner had three main divisions. It had the automotive division where it made brake parts and systems for autos and trucks. It had the motor division which made small and large electric motors and it had the transformer division where it manufactured small and medium power transformers plus liquid-immersed distribution transformers. The transformer division ended up as part of the Cooper Power Systems division. In 1967 Wagner Electric was merged with

Studebaker Studebaker was an American wagon and automobile manufacturer based in South Bend, Indiana, with a building at 1600 Broadway, Times Square, Midtown Manhattan, New York City. Founded in 1852 and incorporated in 1868 as the Studebaker Brothers M ...

and

Worthington Corporation The Worthington Corporation was a diversified American manufacturer that had its roots in Worthington and Baker, a steam pump manufacturer founded in 1845. In 1967 it merged with Studebaker and Wagner Electric to form Studebaker-Worthington. This ...

to create

, a diversified American manufacturer. The combined company included profitable divisions from Studebaker such as Onan generators and STP engine additives, brake and electrical automobile component manufacturing from Wagner Electric, and diverse operations from Worthington that included manufacture of construction equipment, valves and power generation plant.

Wagner brands today

Today Wagner is part of the

Federal-Mogul Federal-Mogul Corporation is an American developer, manufacturer and supplier of products for automotive, commercial, aerospace, marine, rail and off-road vehicles; and industrial, agricultural and power-generation applications. It was acquire ...

Motorparts group. Under the name Wagner Lighting Products, some of their brands include TruView, BriteLite, HalogenGold and LazerBlue. They also make

brake pad Brake pads are a component of disc brakes used in automotive and other applications. Brake pads are composed of steel backing plates with friction material bound to the surface that faces the disc brake rotors. Function Brake pads convert the kin ...

s under the name Wagner Brake Products.

References

American companies disestablished in 1967 American companies established in 1891 Manufacturing companies disestablished in 1967 Manufacturing companies established in 1891 Defunct automotive companies of the United States {{US-manufacturing-company-stub